


JS&MN 3 Sentence Fics

by Ilthit



Category: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke
Genre: 3 Sentence Fiction, F/M, Ficlet, Gen, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-18
Updated: 2015-08-18
Packaged: 2018-04-17 09:38:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4661832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ilthit/pseuds/Ilthit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>From Tumblr prompts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	JS&MN 3 Sentence Fics

**Glass**

The fashion in wine glasses ran towards sturdy and ornate, which Henry found distastefully practical - chip one and you could barely tell. He preferred a simple and thin glass which gave the impression of breaking at the merest touch, a finely crafted thing only a whim away from a mess of shards, spills and a bleeding palm. The beauty of fragile things was all in their potential. 

-

**Stars**

Arabella stuck her head out of the window of her third-floor bedroom at the Greysteels’ house at Norwich. The night was breezy but warm and smelled of flowering summer, and above turned all the old English stars, circling Polaris like pictures in a spinning top.

She knew all the reasons Jonathan couldn’t come, and was content; still, some nights when her bed felt particularly empty, she scanned the skies for strange constellations.

-

**Smile**

There was no doubt that Lady Pole had been dis-enchanted - her energy and resolve in seeking and securing justice for all the victims of her persecutors bore witness to a woman very much in control of her own desires. Yet she did not smile, and gained a reputation as a most fierce and joyless creature, trailing the darkness of her years in a desolate fairy kingdom.

Lady Pole, in fact, did learn to smile now that the grey veil of her enchantment was lifted, but she did not choose to smile when she was angry; she did not choose to smile merely to be polite; she smiled when she was happy, and so her smiles were reserved, for the first year or two, almost entirely to Arabella Strange.

-

**Leaves**

London’s thoroughfares may have been set all around with yellow-curtained tents, but in Yorkshire magicians sold their spells and advice on the edges of towns, by ancient walls, or places where houses turned to shacks or open roads. Hedge-witches, some people called them, because they lived on the boundaries between town and wilderness, magic and craft, human and Faerie; and also occasionally in an actual hedge, with leaves and bugs stuck to their hair almost as a point of pride.

It puzzled some why John Childermass of the Magical Restoration would choose to call himself one, but it puzzled no-one who knew him well.

-

**Fog**

A thick London fog, for all it was wet and cold and flattened one’s hair, was a great leveler, which Henry thought rather excellent whenever he was out walking with a gun in his pocket. Fog made no difference between a gentleman and a rogue, though the tails a footman or the ragged hat of a beggar still revealed by their shape the status of their owner. But should Henry choose to mug a member of the parliament - why! - who could tell it was not some revolutionary merchant trash like that man Bellingham who had shot the prime minister - what a joke that would be!

-

**Secret**

Childermass was no fraud, though he prevaricated, and knew how to keep his mouth shut. He made no attempt to lie about who he was or how he felt about one matter or another, which Mr Norrell found very gratifying, for Mr Norrell did not have the time or inclination to learn to read the webs of pretension that formed polite society. To him, intention was opaque; to Childermass, by contrast, human nature was the easiest thing in the world to read, and an attempt to lie as good as a report upon all your secrets.

-

**Ticking of a Clock**

There are no clocks in Lost-Hope, and yet there it stands by the southern wall, next to the cracked marble statue of a dying bear, exactly the same kind of a grandfather clock that Sir Walter has in his study. A couple dances across Stephen’s vision, she dressed grandly in pages from the Bible, he in a coat trimmed with phoenix feathers that trails sparks as they twirl, their feet moving to the rhythm of every third tick. 

Sir Walter hands him a list of purchases for the lady’s journey to Yorkshire.

-

**Gratitude**

Sir Walter, if I have been remiss in my duties, I can assure you it has not been out of want of gratitude. I am sensible of the honour and esteem you have shown me throughout these years, only I ask you let her rest, sir. The lady’s feet are bleeding and her bones are breaking, sir…

-

**Chrysanthemum**

“Really, Christopher, if you do not curb this enthusiasm for all things Oriental, you shall end up like Mrs M—- with her unsightly dog, blight of a gazebo, and ridiculous affectations of learning Chinese.”

“Chrysantemum tea is said to be excellent for eyesight, Henry,” said Drawlight. “Perhaps if you try some you will gain a greater appreciation for the very wealthy Mrs M—-’s _delightful_ gazebo.”

-

**Candles**

It didn’t have to be candles - a rap on the table would do, or dropping a plate, or a count of three to one, and the spell would know when to commence. It wasn’t candles, either, not when Childermass did the magic; Childermass who lit and blew out candles a dozen times a day if he did once. You didn’t want the sound of spells almost spoken following you through the corridors as you snuffed out the lights for the night.


End file.
